Kitap 2
When they assemble at Saïs on the night of the sacrifice, they keep lamps burning outside around their houses. These lamps are saucers full of salt and oil on which the wick floats, and they burn all night. This is called the Feast of Lamps.
Egyptians who do not come to this are mindful on the night of sacrifice to keep their own lamps burning, and so they are alight not only at Saïs but throughout Egypt [30,27] (nation), Africa Egypt . A sacred tale is told showing why this night is lit up thus and honored.
When the people go to +Heliopolis [31.333,30.1] (deserted settlement), Cairo, Urban, Egypt, Africa Heliopolis and +Kawm al-Farain [30.733,31.2] (deserted settlement), Kafr ash-Shaykh, Lower Egypt, Egypt, Africa Buto , they offer sacrifice only. At Papremis sacrifice is offered and rites performed just as elsewhere; but when the sun is setting, a few of the priests hover about the image, while most of them go and stand in the entrance to the temple with clubs of wood in their hands; others, more than a thousand men fulfilling vows, who also carry wooden clubs, stand in a mass opposite.
The image of the god, in a little gilded wooden shrine, they carry away on the day before this to another sacred building. The few who are left with the image draw a four-wheeled wagon conveying the shrine and the image that is in the shrine; the others stand in the space before the doors and do not let them enter, while the vow-keepers, taking the side of the god, strike them, who defend themselves.
A fierce fight with clubs breaks out there, and they are hit on their heads, and many, I expect, even die from their wounds; although the Egyptians said that nobody dies.
The natives say that they made this assembly a custom from the following incident: the mother of Ares lived in this temple; Ares had been raised apart from her and came, when he grew up, wishing to visit his mother; but as her attendants kept him out and would not let him pass, never having seen him before, Ares brought men from another town, manhandled the attendants, and went in to his mother. From this, they say, this hitting for Ares became a custom in the festivalIt is uncertain what Egyptian deity Herodotus identifies with Ares. In a Greek papyrus, “Ares” is the equivalent for the Egyptian Anhur, a god, apparently, not clearly differentiated from “Shu” or “Heracles.”.
Furthermore, it was the Egyptians who first made it a matter of religious observance not to have intercourse with women in temples or to enter a temple after such intercourse without washing. Nearly all other peoples are less careful in this matter than are the Egyptians and Greeks, and consider a man to be like any other animal;
for beasts and birds (they say) are seen to mate both in the temples and in the sacred precincts; now were this displeasing to the god, the beasts would not do so. This is the reason given by others for practices which I, for my part, dislike;
but the Egyptians in this and in all other matters are exceedingly strict against desecration of their temples.
Although Egypt [30,27] (nation), Africa Egypt has Libya [17,25] (nation), Africa Libya on its borders, it is not a country of many animals. All of them are held sacred; some of these are part of men's households and some not; but if I were to say why they are left alone as sacred, I should end up talking of matters of divinity, which I am especially averse to treating; I have never touched upon such except where necessity has compelled me.
But I will indicate how it is customary to deal with the animals. Men and women are appointed guardians to provide nourishment for each kind respectively; a son inherits this office from his father.
Townsfolk in each place, when they pay their vows, pray to the god to whom the animal is dedicated, shaving all or one half or one third of their children's heads, and weighing the hair in a balance against a sum of silver; then the weight in silver of the hair is given to the female guardian of the creatures, who buys fish with it and feeds them.
Thus, food is provided for them. Whoever kills one of these creatures intentionally is punished with death; if he kills accidentally, he pays whatever penalty the priests appoint. Whoever kills an ibis or a hawk, intentionally or not, must die for it.
There are many household animals; and there would be many more, were it not for what happens among the cats. When the females have a litter, they are no longer receptive to the males; those that seek to have intercourse with them cannot;
so their recourse is to steal and carry off and kill the kittens (but they do not eat what they have killed). The mothers, deprived of their young and desiring to have more, will then approach the males; for they are creatures that love offspring.
And when a fire breaks out, very strange things happen among the cats. The Egyptians stand around in a broken line, thinking more of the cats than of quenching the burning; but the cats slip through or leap over the men and spring into the fire.
When this happens, there is great mourning in Egypt [30,27] (nation), Africa Egypt . The occupants of a house where a cat has died a natural death shave their eyebrows and no more; where a dog has died, the head and the whole body are shaven.
Dead cats are taken away to sacred buildings in the town of +Tall Bastah [31.516,30.566] (deserted settlement), Ash Sharqiyah, Lower Egypt, Egypt, Africa Bubastis , where they are embalmed and buried; female dogs are buried by the townsfolk in their own towns in sacred coffins; and the like is done with mongooses. Shrewmice and hawks are taken away to +Kawm al-Farain [30.733,31.2] (deserted settlement), Kafr ash-Shaykh, Lower Egypt, Egypt, Africa Buto , ibises to the city of Hermes.
There are few bears, and the wolves are little bigger than foxes; both these are buried wherever they are found lying.
The nature of crocodiles is as follows. For the four winter months, it eats nothing. It has four feet, and lives both on land and in the water, for it lays eggs and hatches them out on land and spends the greater part of the day on dry ground, and the night in the river, the water being warmer than the air and dew.
No mortal creature of all which we know grows from so small a beginning to such greatness; for its eggs are not much bigger than goose eggs, and the young crocodile is of a proportional size, but it grows to a length of twenty-eight feet and more.
It has eyes like pigs' eyes, and long, protruding teeth. It is the only animal that has no tongue. It does not move the lower jaw, but brings the upper jaw down upon the lower, uniquely among beasts.
It also has strong claws, and a scaly, impenetrable hide on its back. It is blind in the water, but very keen of sight in the air. Since it lives in the water, its mouth is all full of leeches. All birds and beasts flee from it, except the sandpiper Egyptian spur-winged lapwing (Hoplopterus armatus). , with which it is at peace because this bird does the crocodile a service;
for whenever the crocodile comes ashore out of the water and then opens its mouth (and it does this mostly to catch the west wind), the sandpiper goes into its mouth and eats the leeches; the crocodile is pleased by this service and does the sandpiper no harm.
Some of the Egyptians consider crocodiles sacred; others do not, but treat them as enemies. Those who live near Thebes [32.666,25.683] (deserted settlement), Qina, Upper Egypt, Egypt, Africa Thebes and Birkat Qarun [30.666,29.466] (salt lake), Egypt, Africa lake Moeris consider them very sacred.
Every household raises one crocodile, trained to be tame; they put ornaments of glass and gold on its ears and bracelets on its forefeet, provide special food and offerings for it, and give the creatures the best of treatment while they live; after death, the crocodiles are embalmed and buried in sacred coffins.
But around Elephantine they are not held sacred, and are even eaten. The Egyptians do not call them crocodiles, but khampsae. The Ionians named them crocodiles, from their resemblance to the lizards which they have in their walls κροκόδειλος is Ionic for a lizard; the commoner word is σαύρα or σαῦρος. χάμψα is the Egyptian “em-suh,” a name which survives in the Arabic “timsah,” i.e. em-suh with the feminine article prefixed..
There are many different ways of crocodile hunting; I will write of the way that I think most worth mentioning. The hunter baits a hook with a hog's back, and lets it float into the midst of the river; he himself stays on the bank with a young live pig, which he beats.
Hearing the squeals of the pig, the crocodile goes after the sound, and meets the bait, which it swallows; then the hunters pull the line. When the crocodile is drawn ashore, first of all the hunter smears its eyes over with mud; when this is done, the quarry is very easily mastered—no light matter, without that.
Hippopotamuses are sacred in the district of Papremis, but not elsewhere in Egypt [30,27] (nation), Africa Egypt . They present the following appearance: four-footed, with cloven hooves like cattle; blunt-nosed; with a horse's mane, visible tusks, a horse's tail and voice; big as the biggest bull. Their hide is so thick that, when it is dried, spearshafts are made of it.
Otters are found in the river, too, which the Egyptians consider sacred; and they consider sacred that fish, too, which is called the scale-fish, and the eel. These, and the fox-gooseOr “Nile-goose.” The Egyptian goose (Chenalopex Aegyptica). among birds, are said to be sacred to the god of the Nahr an- Nil [31.1,30.166] (river), AfricaNile.
There is another sacred bird, too, whose name is phoenix. I myself have never seen it, only pictures of it; for the bird seldom comes into Egypt [30,27] (nation), Africa Egypt : once in five hundred years, as the people of +Heliopolis [31.333,30.1] (deserted settlement), Cairo, Urban, Egypt, Africa Heliopolis say.
It is said that the phoenix comes when his father dies. If the picture truly shows his size and appearance, his plumage is partly golden and partly red. He is most like an eagle in shape and size.
What they say this bird manages to do is incredible to me. Flying from Arabian Peninsula [45,25] (region (general)), Asia Arabia to the temple of the sun, they say, he conveys his father encased in myrrh and buries him at the temple of the Sun.
This is how he conveys him: he first molds an egg of myrrh as heavy as he can carry, then tries lifting it, and when he has tried it, he then hollows out the egg and puts his father into it, and plasters over with more myrrh the hollow of the egg into which he has put his father, which is the same in weight with his father lying in it, and he conveys him encased to the temple of the Sun in Egypt [30,27] (nation), Africa Egypt . This is what they say this bird does.
Near Thebes [32.666,25.683] (deserted settlement), Qina, Upper Egypt, Egypt, Africa Thebes there are sacred snakes, harmless to men, small in size, and bearing two horns on the top of their heads. These, when they die, are buried in the temple of Zeus, to whom they are said to be sacred.
There is a place in Arabian Peninsula [45,25] (region (general)), Asia Arabia not far from the town of +Kawm al-Farain [30.733,31.2] (deserted settlement), Kafr ash-Shaykh, Lower Egypt, Egypt, Africa Buto where I went to learn about the winged serpents. When I arrived there, I saw innumerable bones and backbones of serpents: many heaps of backbones, great and small and even smaller.
This place, where the backbones lay scattered, is where a narrow mountain pass opens into a great plain, which adjoins the plain of Egypt [30,27] (nation), Africa Egypt .
Winged serpents are said to fly from Arabian Peninsula [45,25] (region (general)), Asia Arabia at the beginning of spring, making for Egypt [30,27] (nation), Africa Egypt ; but the ibis birds encounter the invaders in this pass and kill them.
The Arabians say that the ibis is greatly honored by the Egyptians for this service, and the Egyptians give the same reason for honoring these birds.